Real estate in the Catskills symbolizes a traditional and slower way of life.
We recreate that romantic house on the hill with our new old designs. Fireplaces, wrap-around porches, wide plank floors and vintage fixtures are only the beginning of these Catskill real estate offerings.
Catskill Farms has saved more than a few families from the 'this old house fantasy'.
We build homes that work - from day 1.
Curated by: Charles Petersheim

www.thecatskillfarms.com

Saturday, May 3, 2014

Stone Ridge Farm Whole House Energy Evaluation

You know, we build pretty good homes - we put a lot of power 'under the hood', be it the spray foam insulation, the on demand hot water heaters, the high efficiency furnaces - all just part of our standard build specifications. It's pretty uncommon. I think our clients just expect us to be doing this - since we don't get much arguments like - 'can we use batt insulation and save $5,000 today so we can spend $50k over the next 10 years in wasted energy costs?'

But the metal really hits the road when they bring the post-build performance tester in and they perform a blower door test to test the efficiency of the structure. This isn't a wink and a nod pre-construction theoretical exercise. This is a test, and the results are black and white. Most towns don't require it, but it is code and law - but since just a few builders can actually pass the test, that I think most friendly code enforcers don't want to be chased from town so they choose to ignore that part of the code/law.

So, up above, where it says 'Results' and then '1.8 ACH -50' - that means 1.8 air exchanges per hour - which is 3x better than energy star (the sought after level) and more than 5x standard construction.

It's serious business and means direct savings. Plus its a validation that our typical and assumed standard practices are far above when other companies try real hard.

And like I think I've said about our clients over and over, they get what we are doing and how we are different in our seriousness of approach to aesthetic and functional details.